mandela's story. mr. speaker, between 1986 and 1990 the right honorable gentleman, myself and peter pike, the former member for burnly, made three visits to south africa at the invitation of the followers of christ working for a peaceful resolution of the situation there. on our return from our first visit, we made joint speech speeches in a debate here in the house of commons on june the 17th referring to each other as our honorable friends, a point dually note -- duly noted by -- [inaudible] we had gone together, safety in numbers, at a time when the anc was still banned, the political situation deteriorating, violence abroad and where the isolation of south africa was impacting on the flow of anything. we found and were able to report back to our respective party leaders, and i had half an hour with an anxious, worried and very uncertain margaret thatcher. we reported back on the tragic success of apartheid in separating one person from another, on the urgency of the need for change to avoid a looming